In the Year of Jubilee

The Jubilee marks the fiftieth year of the reign of Queen Victoria. Dickensian in its sweeping scope of London life, Jubilee depicts the harsh and disreputable conditions of lower-middle class life at the end of the 19th century. (Introduction by S. Kovalchik)

First Page:

IN THE YEAR OF JUBILEE

By George Gissing

Part I: Miss. Lord

CHAPTER 1

At eight o'clock on Sunday morning, Arthur Peachey unlocked his front
door, and quietly went forth. He had not ventured to ask that early
breakfast should be prepared for him. Enough that he was leaving
home for a summer holiday the first he had allowed himself since his
marriage three years ago.

It was a house in De Crespigny Park; unattached, double fronted, with
half sunk basement, and a flight of steps to the stucco pillars at
the entrance. De Crespigny Park, a thoroughfare connecting Grove
Lane, Camberwell, with Denmark Hill, presents a double row of similar
dwellings; its clean breadth, with foliage of trees and shrubs in front
gardens, makes it pleasant to the eye that finds pleasure in suburban
London. In point of respectability, it has claims only to be appreciated
by the ambitious middle class of Camberwell. Each house seems to remind
its neighbour, with all the complacence expressible in buff brick, that
in this locality lodgings are not to let.